"The more information out there, the easier it is for someone to steal it," he said. It's easy for old accounts to be forgotten about and for personal information to find its way online. If you don't audit your presence on the internet you can quickly find yourself the victim of a cybercriminal.

Vigliarolo mentioned several websites that help internet users find and close forgotten accounts and remove themselves from mailing lists, such as JustDelete.me, Deseat.me, and Unroll.me. TechRepublic does not endorse these sites or verify their efficacy.

Vigliarolo also mentioned an easy way to prevent personally identifying information from being uncovered: It's as simple as putting in false birthdates, addresses, or phone numbers when signing up for services that don't really need that data.